The Cleaner
Right in there? Do I have to sit closer or
will it pick up what I’m saying? I’m fine like this? Great. I’m just gonna
start at the start and give you the whole bit okay?
In 1972 I dropped outta school. I wanted to
own a business, not study business, ya know. So I got a job working for Dougie
Beerdstrom. Dougie owned three buildings downtown and I got the contract to
clean one of them. I had to work nights, they were long and lonely, but they
were mine.
The toughest part was getting used to eating
dinner when everyone else was having breakfast. I’d be at a diner eating steak
and drinking a beer while everyone else was drinking coffee and eating muffins.
I’d get a lot of looks and at first I felt like I needed to explain ya know,
but after a while I just didn’t care.
After a year goes by, Dougie calls me into
his office. And I’m all scared, thinkin’ I’m gonna get fired. But Dougie sits
me down and says, “Okay Chuck, you’re a good kid. You do a good job, you work
hard and every day I come in here and nothing’s missing. I was giving you tests
all year, leaving files and shit out, but you never touched anything. Even
pennies man, pennies and you’d pick them up and put them on my goddamn desk!
Okay, so this is what’s gonna happen. I
fired all my other contracts, they’re yours now. You’ve got the three buildings
but I’ve gotta problem. You’ve gotta get some more guys in here. You’re gonna
have to hire some people or we can’t do business. You’ve got three weeks to
hire some people so get to it.”
It took me two weeks to find some people.
Five more guys. I figured we’d work two to a building. So before we get working
I sit them all down in my living room and say, “This is the way it is. I find
out from our clients that anything is missing, you’re all fired. I don’t care
what it is, you’re all gone and I’ll hire new guys. Okay?”
Oh, you couldn’t do that nowadays, no way.
The government or the fucking unions would get right on your ass and shut you
down. But back then I could, mainly because the guys were illegal so that meant
I could pay them shit wages too. It’s weird how things work out though, I
thought I’d get a couple of years out of those guys. Pepper and Jose are still
with me. Juan died in the fire of ’86, Tariq went back to his country that doesn’t
exist no more, and the other guy is really, better off…where he is.
Pepper and Jose don’t know nothing about
this. They’re good guys.
So after two years of only working for
Dougie, I got a call from some guy wanted me to clean his buildings, so I got
Pepper to hire some people and take them over there. Soon after that everyone
was calling me. Jose got his own crew, Tariq and Juan got crews, Devindar,
Vinnie Patel we call him – he got a crew and we were busy all the time. We had
to fire Jose’s crew and he got a kick out of it. Hired his brother, a cousin,
and his nephew. They still work for me too.
Anyway, in ’82 everything changed. I
must’ve been one of the first people to see Smoke in action. I was having a
cigarette outside the Millside Bank when I see this guy running along the tops
of the buildings. Now in ’82 the Dashielle
Building
There weren’t so many of them then. You’d
maybe hear people talking about the same five all the time. There was Smoke.
And Crossfire – he was pretty amazing I’ll give him that. And Spark, Dogstar, and Spitfire. Then as the
city got bigger, there’d be more and more of them showing up. And the thing was
the more supers show up, the worse the crooks got. Those punks Smoke caught
that night; the worse they had on them was a knife. Now some high-school drop
out drug addict is carrying around two sawed off shotguns and a shitload of
grenades just so’s he can go and rob convenience stores. Jeez!
Anyway, I guess I had the idea when I saw
Smoke grab those kids. He’d tied them up to a lamp post that got knocked over.
And that’s what got me thinking. So I joined the chamber of commerce, got a bug
in the mayor’s ear. Told him I could do the city clean up for a third of what
it’d cost the city. The Mayfair Bank job is what sold him on it.
You remember the Mayfair ?
Yeah, it was a beautiful building. They don’t make em like that no more. Anyway,
they were holed up in there for four days, waiting for the weekend. Problem
was, they didn’t think about how they were going to the bathroom. Then that
woman, the one that was on the news all the time after, she went downstairs to
the vault and thought she smelled sewer gas. Next thing you know, the city
sends over some maintenance guys and the fire department all because this bank
broad smells some shit. Anyway, they open the vault and find fifteen guns
pointed at them. Then all hell breaks loose. The robbers hold everyone hostage,
no one can talk to them, then Crossfire busts in. That broad says he got shot
about hundred times and nothing happened, then he channels all that energy back
at them, blows the back wall out of the bank, gets the hostages out and saves
the day. Only problem is, the bad guys set off a whole bunch of explosives in
the vault, that along with the previous structural damage cause the building to
collapse. The bad guys all died, but that was okay because the good people got
out. It cost me four grand to clean that up and I did it in a week. Charged the
city fifteen thousand and told ‘em it would’ve cost them fifty-five if they did
it themselves. Got a long-term contract after that.
The Mayfair
was the biggest job I had to do for a while. I mean, mostly it was uh, small
jobs like busted lamp posts and some damage to the facades of a lot of
buildings. “Mopping up” we called it. But then there weren’t a whole lot of the
supers around either.
What’s frustrating is that the public doesn’t
know anything, hell, we didn’t know anything was wrong until we pulled out the
extra rubble and discovered the other building, But then I found a body. Then
we found another. All in all we found fifteen people in there, you know. And
then that got to be part of the job. Cleaning up the bodies. But the media
never reported that, the people didn’t know. I’d try to tell someone and, and
they wouldn’t listen! That goddamn Spitfire killed 220 people but it wasn’t his
fault. Sure he set the fire around Sticks, but he didn’t know there was a gas
main under there. I knew! I knew it! But did anything happen? No! Because it
was for the greater good that they died. He saved two people that day. That’s
all Sticks had was two people. And I’m not arguing that Stick wasn’t bad, I
know he killed a hell of a lot of other people, but I don’t think he killed
220. What? Yeah, that was the fire Juan died in. The fire of ’86.
Fucking Spitfire he didn’t even know those
people died. But I told him before I killed him. It was a few years later, but
I told him.
The thing that turned me, you know, the
thing that opened my eyes was that big fight in ’89. You saw the news footage,
jeez you’re old enough, Crossfire carrying that plane down, the wings crashing
into a building, but Crossfire, saved all 300 people on that plane. What they
didn’t show you was the two buildings that collapsed when the wings cut into
them. I pulled fifteen bodies out of those piles. Rescue crews saved 37. And
the supers, who for once cleaned up after themselves, pulled out 100. Not bad,
though, 152 people were saved, but 46 died. I say it opened my eyes, but I
didn’t want it to, you know? I wanted to think that they still did good. But
then it got to the point where every time we had a crew on a site, they was
digging up bodies. We had ta get special suits made just in case there was
biohazards and shit! And here I started out with a broom and some glass
cleaner, now I got guys wearing hazmat suits and getting training on how to
deal with ambient radiation.
Anyway, we kept pulling bodies out and
cleaning up after them and they kept standing in the spotlight wearing those ridiculous
costumes.
Ramrod was my first one. And he was easy.
Well, he wasn’t easy, I followed him for five days before I got up the nerve to
do it. On nights when Ramrod is on patrol, someone drives around the city,
taking notes of where he’s been and what we’re going to have to fix; ‘cause
he’s just so damn reckless and destructive. Anyway, it was my week to drive
around. The first night I tracked him to his apartment. He lived in this shitty
little ground floor apartment on Forrester. I was surprised you know, I figured
a big shot like that would live in some huge house or something. But I guess
that’s all he could afford. Anyway, I watched him from the bushes. But I
couldn’t do it.
Every night I couldn’t do it. He’d be alone
and I’d talk myself out of it. Finally, on the Friday, I watched him. He was
sitting on his couch, in his underwear. I watched him drink an entire bottle of
whisky like it was water. Then he put his head in his hands and cried. He cried
for about twenty minutes and passed out. I realized I wasn’t going to get a
better chance than that. So I slid the window open, snuck in and smashed his
skull with his war hammer.
Seeing him like that I knew, they were just
people. That’s all. Once you strip away the costume, they’re nothing special.
Just meat. Just garbage.
The funny thing was, we got the call from
his landlord to clean his rooms. Pepper took the call, I had nothing to do with
it.
So there was a death in the family.
Everybody was really upset over Ramrod, talkin’ about what a great hero he was
and everything. You know, it was like once he died, everybody forgot how vicious
he was. One guy I heard about had a car that Ramrod smashed and he turned it
into a shrine to the guy. Had people lined up around the block to leave flowers
there. Fucking morons.
It never got easy you know? I was always
sick afterward. I’d hold it together long enough to get home, then I’d puke all
night. My throat’d be raw for days afterward.
After Ramrod, I did the Farmer. Nobody knew
that Farmer was Dave Ramsarran. I only figured it out because I got the
contract to clean his offices. To be honest with you, aside from Ramrod duty, I
don’t normally do small jobs like that anymore. I tend to stay in the office,
or I’ll help out on bigger sites. But I did Ramsarran’s offices because our
regular guy was sick and no one else was available.
So he was there at his desk and I was
talking to him. Once he realized I owned the company and wasn’t just hired
help, he was a lot nicer to me. So we’re talking about nothing really important
and he gets up outta his chair. Only he must of done it too fast because I see
him wince and grab his side. Now, I’d seen the news the night before. And they
reported that the Farmer was hurt in a brawl down on Main .
The news said he’d been hit and beaten pretty bad. I go over to help him out
and I get right beside him and notice that he’s wearing make-up. And I can see
that his face is all bruised up. Then I see that his nose is broken and his
knuckles are all banged up.
I thought that was pretty funny you know?
The Farmer is some hick who loves to brawl and this Ramsarran guy is smart and rich
and runs a business. I figured it out pretty quick then. So I poisoned his
coffee. Took me three weeks.
Now I know Farmer died in a fight. So I
didn’t directly kill him, but you saw the news. These guys always seem to have
a news crew following them around. You saw how bad that fight was. Normally,
he’d get kicked around a bit, but that last fight, whoo, he was dying on his
feet. Didn’t even get a punch in, took a bat to the back, puked, went down,
then that was it.
I figured someone would figure out how he
died. But nothing happened. Then when I found out that you guys don’t do
autopsies out of respect for their “secret identities”, I knew I was in good
shape.
After Farmer, I took some time off. I
focused on work and landed a huge contract. Just huge. After Ramrod and Farmer
died, the city wanted to do what they could to protect the supers. So they
commissioned an architect and built the Hall. I played some golf, took some
guys out to dinner and got the contract without even having to bid for it.
That was a pretty impressive building,
pretty high-tech, you know? My people had to go through security checks,
psychiatric exams, and some other unbelievable shit. So we got the keys and
contract and when it was all built up we moved in. You know, it was more like a
remote office. My people wore uniforms and had badges, but none of the supers
told them what to do. I gave Pepper that gig.
Have you ever been inside the Hall? It’s
amazing. Stuff you’d see at a computer factory or a NASA. A lot of technology
that is really out of place in a city like this. And medical equipment; they
got surgeons and doctors who do shifts there like they do at the hospital. And
I heard that a lot of doctors weren’t goin’ back to the hospital because they
wanted to hang out with the supers. That bugged me a lot. That was wrong, they
should’ve been helping everybody, not just the supers. So no, I don’t feel too
bad that a lot of those doctors got hurt when I blew up the Hall.
Yeah, that’s right, I blew it up. Just me.
Okay, I want to make that clear, I did it on my own. I’ll tell you later how I
did it, but I’m glad it’s gone. It took up too much space, space that could’ve
been used for houses or businesses. And I hear that they’re turnin’ it into a
park. I guess I shouldn’t a done that one. Kinda came back and bit me in the
ass.
So we cleaned the Hall. While Pepper ran
the day to day, I made sure everyone had a chance to go in. We had 12 hour
shifts, six people per shift. I had everyone do a week’s work because it was
fair. I knew they were all dying to be around the supers, and I didn’t think it
was fair to exclude anyone. And Pepper liked it when I came for my shift
because he could boss me around. Pepper got pretty comfortable there. He made a
lot of in-roads for us. They trusted Pepper a lot of those guys. And he
deserved their trust. Pepper is a great guy, one of the nicest guys around.
Pepper always worked hard and I appreciated
it. We’d go fishing in the summer. Well, we pretended to go fishing. He’d just
say that to his wife so we could go up north and drink for a weekend. I don’t
have a family, so you know? Who cares what I did right.
I never had time that’s why. I was always
working, setting stuff up, buying supplies, making contacts. I woke up one
morning and realized that I hadn’t thought about sex in three months. You know
what happens when you realize you hadn’t thought about sex in a long time? It’s
all you think about. So I thought about it then it went away.
Having access to the Hall was a real
blessing. I could come and go as I pleased, I could find shit out about the
supers. Like where they lived and other stuff. I mean, I can’t believe how
stupid they are! How arrogant! I knew everything about them from one file on a
computer. I knew everything about that building from another. They made it so
easy.
You know what. I did the right thing.
They’re gone now. And things are getting back to normal aren’t they? People
still walk the streets at night. They go out and live their lives. No one has
to worry about being hit by a thrown car or a collapsing building. We can live
normally again.
I didn’t like killing any of them. I mean,
it had to be done, but I never felt good about it. You know, after a while the
shakes stopped, but I still have dreams about them. The stupid thing I did, but
it was the right thing, was to blow up the Hall during the company picnic. I
didn’t want any of my people getting hurt, that’s why I did it then. I keep
care of my family.
Who? Diva? Yep, Diva had to die too. She
really did. Some of those guys, a lot of those guys, they did what they did
because, maybe, they wanted to help. Diva wanted the attention. I mean, her
fucking name showed that she wanted attention. The only reason I got to her was
because I overheard a few of them talking. I was cleaning out the change rooms
and a few of the supers were in there talking about, well, about stuff guys
talk about while they’re in a locker room. Crude stuff especially since they
were talking about a colleague, someone who’d risked her life for them. Anyway,
the one guy said that after she sings, she’s exhausted, can’t move a muscle at
all. It’s almost as if she’s catatonic. So I followed her around one night.
She used her powers a lot that time and
then got picked up by Bodyguard. Diva and Bodyguard. What a ridiculous team. He
picks her up in the Cadillac and drives her home, puts her to bed. I broke into
her house, that’s how I know. I was hiding in her closet. It was pretty easy to
do, she was wiped right out, couldn’t move at all but her eyes were wide open.
I watched her eyes the whole time. She was just looking at me as I came over
and I strangled her. I figured that Bodyguard would be coming up to check on
her sometime so I left him a note and a handgun. The note said, “good job.” You
guys thought he killed her, then killed himself. No, it was me. I did it. Not
sure what he did with the note though. That’s a mystery to me too.
Jarhead? Yeah, I did him. You haven’t found
the body? I threw it in the river. Last November. Jarhead was a wannabe. That
guy dressed up like a soldier, acted like a soldier, but I’ll be goddamned if
he ever saw combat. He pranced around here like a flamin’ hero while kids
overseas, real heroes, are dying. My dad fought in World War 2 and it pissed
him off that there were kids still dying in wars. Broke his heart every time he
heard about some poor kid dying away from home.
I followed Jarhead home. He was a loner.
Didn’t like to stay at the hall and I figured out why. He was a druggie. Took a
lot of drugs. Not sure what kind, but I went through his medicine cabinet and
there were a lot of bottles. Different names on them, but the same looking
pills. No. I don’t remember. I can’t tell you what the drug was. Because I
don’t remember. It was a while ago that’s why. I was tailing him for a while.
He was up at Bester and Fitz, breaking up a smuggling job. I don’t know what
they were smuggling. He threw some smoke grenades in there, jumped in while no
one could see, beat up six guys and after the smoke cleared, he was standing
there in the middle. Like he was posing. Hoping for someone to see him. And he
stood there for a while and I watched. And still no one came up to him. And his
shoulders dropped, his hands came off his hips, and he looked like he was
sulking. Damn! No one saw him save the day and he acted like a six year old kid
who’d just been spanked. Like I said, I followed him home. He went in, I saw a
light go on upstairs, then it turned off. I had a gun. Figured I’d pop him
while he slept. But when I broke in he was sitting on the couch, in his
underwear with a bottle and a bunch of pills. He looked at me and laughed. Not
scared or cocky or nothing like that, just like seeing me standing in his
living room was the funniest thing he’d ever seen. And I says to him, “How many
of those have you taken?”
“A lot,” he says.
“Take a lot more,” I says and point the gun
at him. And the son of a bitch laughs again and says okay. And I watch him take
the pills, a few at a time until he nods off, then I watch him until he stops
breathing and then I get rid of his body. Easy.
What pisses me off the most was the
costumes. They look so ridiculous in those costumes. They were there to hide
their identities, you know, to keep their private lives private. But they gotta
wear those costumes so everyone can see them. So they can set themselves apart
from everyone else. So they can get the attention.
Farmer was just a normal guy who liked
throwing punches around. That Ramsarran guy probably went to his shrink, the
doctor told him he had anger issues that he needed to work out, so he puts on a
costume and beats people up. Because he needed the attention. A normal guy with
anger issues would’ve taken up boxing or bought a heavy bag and beat the shit
outta it. But not these supers. Fucking prima donnas!
Yeah, I said I’d tell you how I blew up the
hall. It was easy. You know what kind of shit your average household cleaner is
made of? Pretty dangerous stuff man. And I had gallons and gallons of that shit
you know? It was simple. I hid the bags and buckets around the place. There’s
this one room they don’t use, I don’t know what the hell it’s for, it’s like a
closet. Anyway, I hid about sixteen gallons of the shit in there, wired them to
detonate through a signal from a beeper and a disposable cell phone. Then I got
all those bleaches and cleansers and stuff, you mix those together and you’ve
got some toxic gases too. Shit like that’ll burn your lungs pretty bad. That’s
how Puddle died. He inhaled a lot of those gases. You heard it took him three
days to die? Yeah. I know. That’s a long time. No. No, I don’t.
Well, you can find that shit out pretty
easy. The goddamn internet has it all right? Anarchists Cookbook? Library
books. Hell, it’s easy. So I made sure none of my people where there. Made sure
that I did it during our company picnic. I know that was suspicious, but
there’s no way any of my people were going to get hurt in that, no way. And you
guys weren’t going to figure it out were you? What? Bullshit! You guys found
shit all. You don’t think I know how to clean up after a crime scene? Hell,
I’ve been at more crime scenes than you’ve been to birthday parties. There was
nothing you guys could’a found there that woulda linked anybody to it.
Accelerant walked around that place all the time, who’s to say that the fumes
from that closet didn’t mix with those flames of his and blow up. You wouldn’t
have figured me for it. No way.
Hey, tell me honestly now, you guys must be
lovin’ this. Really, you cops was here first and got looked over for all the
good shit ya did. I always thought it was bullshit how you guys get sued by
some asshole carjacker who got his arm broke when some cop kid pulled him out
of a stolen car, but one of them fucking supers beats up Marginalized and no
one gets sued at all. Bullshit man, it’s cause the city’s got money that’s why.
That fuckin’ Farmer’s got deep pockets right, but the Repo Man never sued him.
He should though, take Ramsarran’s fuckin’ estate for everything. But you cops
right, you’re doing better now right? People’re respecting youse guys again
right? Good.
Yeah, I don’t think you guy’s ever woulda
figured out it was me that done it. I don’t feel bad fer doin’ it either right?
I don’t. I saved a lot of people’s lives. People who might have died because
some super got thrown through a building, people just working for a living end
up dead when their office collapses on them ‘cause some bastard with a huge ego
needs to see hisself in the papers.
So why am I confessing? Maybe cause I
haven’t slept right since it happened. It’s been three months since I blew them
up and I might have gotten four straight hours of sleep in one night. And
people’re still crying over them. They need to know how lucky they are that the
bad guys are gone. They need to know that they’re actually safer now. Way
safer. And I needed them to know. I need them to know. I saved them. And they
need to know.
Do you need more than that? I think I
covered everything. I’m not sorry they
died. I’m really not. They hurt too many people, did more bad than good, but everybody
just fucking bought into it. And it didn’t matter. And they didn’t care and
that made it so much worse than it should’ve been.
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